WATCH: She Presses a Piece of a Water Bottle to an Iron and Makes Something Beautiful

We all know that it’s better for the environment to use reusable water bottles rather than plastic bottles. But if you’re going to use plastic bottles to get your fill of H2O, then it would be environmentally conscious to recycle or re-purpose the bottles in some way. And what better way to make use of them than to turn them into something that can be worn over and over again? The perfect example are these beautiful but simple bracelets that Innova Crafts made out of plastic water bottles with the help of an iron.

Jewelry can often be extremely expensive and, let’s be honest, how often do you wear those bracelets or necklaces that you spent serious cash on? The truth is, not that frequently.

These bracelets are the best of all worlds! Not only are they basically free (you just had to buy the plastic bottle, unless you scavenged it out of the recycling), but they only take a few minutes to make. No serious painting or crafting skills are required, and you have adorable bracelets that you can wear over and over again. Because this is a DIY, you also get to personalize the bracelet to a pattern or color palette that you love, too!

But these bracelets don’t just help your budget, you are ultimately helping the world by recycling plastic in an economical way.

Did you know that enough plastic water bottles are wasted each year that they could wrap around the earth 190 times. That is a whole lot of plastic wasted. Worse still, plastic is usually burned, a process which does nothing to help the dangerous greenhouse gas situation the world is currently in.

To get started, you only need a few basic household tools! You probably have most of these materials sitting at home right now. Once you have a design in mind that you want to bring to life in the form of a fashionable bracelet, here’s what you’ll need to get started:

Materials

Plastic bottle

Tape

Scissors

Iron

Nail polish or acrylic paint

Step 1: Strip the plastic bottle of any labels, making sure you clean off any of the lingering sticker residue.Step 2: Tape one section of your water bottle, about the width of two pieces of tape.Step 3: Cut the plastic bottle away from the taped off section. Peel off the tape so you have a plastic band.Step 4: Remove the steam from your iron and let it heat up to a medium heat. When the iron has heated up, press the plastic circle against the hot surface until they begin to round out. Do this on both sides of the plastic circle.Step 5: Use your nail polish or paint to decorate the inside of the band. Let the paint dry before wearing!

These bracelets are so easy to make, we wouldn’t blame you for making yourself a whole bunch of them, all in different colors and patterns. These would also make great gifts for friend and fun costume jewelry for kids, too.